The move to have Seth McFarlane, the host of the 85th annual Academy Awards ceremony, announce this year's Oscar nominations earlier Thursday was made to add spice to what's typically a quiet news conference, but the 5,700 voting members of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences apparently didn't want to be overshadowed.

In what was supposed to be a pretty predictable list of nominees, the Academy threw in a number of nominees that were head-scratchers and others that seemed to come out of nowhere. Perhaps more so than any other year, and in a news conference that needed no other awkwardly surprising moments after McFarlane's Adolf Hitler joke, the Academy decided to stray far from what was expected and made some rather puzzling decisions in several categories, but most notably in two of the most important ones - Best Picture and Best Director.

As I predicted on Wednesday, the Academy decided to go with nine nominees in the Best Picture category, but what no one saw coming was virtual lock "Moonrise Kingdom" being left out in favor of "Beasts of the Southern Wild" and "Les Miserables." Both films seemed to split critics in terms of favorable opinion while "Kingdom" was a universal hit with moviegoers in general. The omission is equal parts heartbreaking and baffling, but in hindsight typical of a group of voters who have shown "Kingdom" director Wes Anderson no love in the past. The other Best Picture nominees were "Argo," "Amour," "Django Unchained," "Life of Pi," "Lincoln," "Silver Linings Playbook" and "Zero Dark Thirty."

However, the mental lapse in that category by the Academy was nothing compared to what was experienced when the names for Best Director were announced. Typically, either all five or four of the nominees in this category match up with the nominees for the Directors Guild of America award. This year? Only two.

While this year's five nominee for the Oscar do have films nominated for Best Picture - historically, Best Director nominees match up with the Best Picture nominees - notably absent were Ben Affleck, director of "Argo," Tom Hooper, director of "Les Miserables," and 2009 winner of the Academy's Best Director Kathryn Bigelow, whose "Zero Dark Thirty" is currently favored to win Best Picture. The trio received DGA nominations but were passed over by the Academy for non-DGA nominees "Silver Linings Playbook" director David. O. Russell, "Amour" director Michael Haneke and "Beasts of the Southern Wild" director Benh Zeitlin.

Affleck and Bigelow being passed over certainly are the two biggest snubs of the Oscar season, while Hooper being left out likely could be attributed to the film being disliked by many and him having won the same category two years ago for "The King's Speech." Bigelow might have suffered a similar fate, but given the Academy's history of not rewarding women for their filmmaking accomplishments, it's not hard to fathom that Bigelow was omitted from many ballots because she is the first and only female to ever win the category and her winning would have made her one of only 19 directors and obviously the only female to win multiple Oscars in the category.

The decision sets up an interesting scenario in which, right now, it looks like the Best Picture winner could be a film whose director does not win Best Director, a rarity in the history of the Academy Awards. "Zero Dark Thirty" is heavily favored presently to win Best Picture, so with Bigelow not nominated, it looks like Steve Spielberg could be in line for his third Best Director win - winning would make him the third director to have won the award three times. But then again, Bigelow not being nominated and Spielberg getting nominated means that "Lincoln" could step right up and win Best Picture. If that happened, it'd be another year in which the Academy would be sending a message through its winners. In 2007, it said no to "gay cowboys" by shunning "Brokeback Mountain." If "Zero Dark Thirty" doesn't win Best Picture, it could be the Academy once again reinforcing that it doesn't seem to like female-driven projects with strong, independent female leads.

The Best Actor and Best Actress went mostly according to plan. Most pundits, including myself, felt that John Hawkes' role in "The Sessions" was a lock, but he was omitted with Joaquin Phoenix from "The Master" being selected instead. The one question mark coming into the day, Hugh Jackman in "Les Miserables," was nominated along with Bradley Cooper in "Silver Linings Playbook," Daniel Day-Lewis in "Lincoln," and Denzel Washington in "Flight."

On Wednesday, I had said in predicting the Best Actress nominees that four were locks, and the Academy held true to that by nominating Jessica Chastain for "Zero Dark Thirty," Jennifer Lawrence for "Silver Linings Playbook," Emmanuelle Riva in "Amour" and Naomi Watts in "The Impossible." The question mark on Wednesday was Marion Cotillard's role in "Rust and Bone," which the Academy overlooked in favor of "Beast of the Southern Wild" nine-year-old actress Quvenzhane Wallis, a move was surprising given Wallis' age.

Best Supporting Actor was predictable, as well, with nominees being Alan Arkin for "Argo," Robert De Niro for "Silver Linings Playbook," Philip Seymour Hoffman for "The Master" and Tommy Lee Jones for "Lincoln." On Wednesday, I said the final slot would be filled by a "Django Unchained" actor. I felt Leonardo DiCaprio would get the nomination, but the Academy ended up choosing Christoph Waltz.

Likewise, Best Supporting Actress nominees Amy Adams for "The Master," Sally Field for "Lincoln," Helen Hunt for "The Sessions," and Anne Hathaway for "Les Miserables" were locks coming into Thursday. The fifth and final spot was taken by "Silver Linings Playbook" actress Jacki Weaver despite Maggie Smith in "The Exotic Marigold Hotel" being favored to fill the final slot.

This year's Oscars ceremony will take place Feb. 26. If the nomination ceremony was any indication, it could be an unpredictable night, though one thing is certain - undoubtedly, the Academy is looking to reinforce its tendencies and send a clear message as to what it does and does not approve of.

Scott Hansen is a sports writer for the Manitowoc Herald Times Reporter and a lifelong movie buff. As our resident Academy Awards expert, he correctly predicted seven of eight winners at last year's Oscars. He also saw nearly 150 movies in 2012.

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Scott Hansen column: Snubs abound in 2013 Oscar nominations

The move to have Seth McFarlane, the host of the 85th annual Academy Awards ceremony, announce this year's Oscar nominations earlier Thursday was made to add spice to what's typically a quiet news

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